Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/589

.] it has been represented. Congress can regulate it properly, and I have no doubt they will. An honorable gentleman has asked, Will you put the body of the state in prison? How is it between independent states? If a government refuses to do justice to individuals, war is the consequence Is this the bloody alternative to which we are referred. Suppose justice was refused to be done by a particular state to another; I am not of the same opinion with the honorable gentleman. I think, whatever the law of nations may say, that any doubt respecting the construction that a state may be plaintiff, and not defendant, is taken away by the words where a state shall be a party. But it is objected that this is retrospective in its nature. If thoroughly considered, this objection will vanish. It is only to render valid and effective existing claims, and secure that justice, ultimately, which is to be found in every regular government. It is said to be disgraceful. What would be the disgrace? Would it not be that Virginia, after eight states had adopted the government, none of which opposed the federal jurisdiction in this case, rejected it on this account? I was surprised, after hearing him speak so strenuously in praise of the trial by jury, that he would rather give it up than have it regulated as it is in the Constitution. Why? Because it is not established in civil cases, and in criminal cases the jury will not come from the vicinage. It is not excluded in civil cases, nor is a jury from the vicinage in criminal cases excluded. This house has resounded repeatedly with this observation—that where a term is used, all its concomitants follow from the same phrase. Thus, as the trial by jury is established in criminal cases, the incidental right of challenging and excepting is also established, which secures, in the utmost latitude, the benefit of impartiality in the jurors. I beg those gentlemen who deny this doctrine to inform me what part of the bill of English rights, or Great Charter, provides this right. The Great Charter only provides that "no man shall be deprived of the free enjoyment of his life, liberty, or property, unless declared to be forfeited by the judgment of his peers, or the law of the land." The bill of rights gives no additional security on the subject of trial by jury. Where is the provision made, in England, that a jury shall be had in civil cases? This is secured by no constitutional provision. It is left to the temper and genius of the people to preserve and protect it.